From: Scott Roberts (jse885@localnet.com)
Date: Wed Feb 23 2005 - 17:22:26 GMT
Joe,
Scott said:
By "semiotic" I am thnking of Peirce's Thirdness, a triadic relation of
interpretant, sign, and referent. Peirce argues that such a relation cannot
be built out of Seconds or Firsts (a Second is a collision or contact
between two objects, an action/reaction, a First is a quale, in the
philosophical sense, e.g., an experience of redness). [skip]
Joe said:
Scott, your thinking on 'semiotic' is very interesting. I am not familiar
with Pierce so I use his words as I understand your thought. You use
"Peirce's Thirdness, a triadic relation of interpretant, sign, and referent"
as a springboard to your thought on 'semiotic'.
I apply interpretant, sign, and referent to a sentient aware of an
individual amoeba of the organic level. The referent is DQ organic level.
The sign is the word or SQ Amoeba. The interpretant is obscure. Hindu
'reincarnation' might be used as interpretant in that I have been here
before.
Scott:
I'm not sure if what you are describing here is a person (afflicted with S/O
consciousness) observing an amoeba, or something else, like another amoeba
observing an amoeba. On the latter, I would not know and cannot guess what
an interpretant would be like -- and as an interpretant changes, so would
the sign and the referent.
On the former, when a S/O person observes an amoeba, the thing is that the
person does NOT treat the amoeba as a sign. Instead it is seen as an object.
That, in sum, is what the S/O affliction consists of. The difference can be
seen by comparing a person reading a word in a language s/he knows, and
seeing a word written in a script s/he is unfamiliar with. In the first
case, one moves through the word to its meaning, in the second one is
stopped by the object. (By the way, though I am saying here "S/O affliction"
that should be taken somewhat tongue-in-cheek. There is a reason, I believe
for humankind's going through this stage of S/O -- though it cuts us off
from the divine nature of amoebae, it serves a greater purpose -- but that
is another discussion).
I just ran across a curious passage in Bernadette Roberts' *What is Self?"
which bears on this "semiotic" discussion. Here it is:
"Although it is not our intention to go into the nature of "pure" sensory
knowing, it is important to note that once consciousness [by which she means
S/O consciousness] falls away sensory knowing turns out to be quite
different from what we had previously believed it to be. Where we thought
the senses had been responsible for discriminating the particular and
singular, and believed that consciousness and the intellect posited the
universal or whole, it turns out to be the other way around. The senses do
not know, and cannot focus on, the particular or singular; it is nowhere in
there power to do so. Consciousness alone has this focusing and
discriminating power."
Joe said:
IMO Another way of looking at 'interpretant' is suggested by Gurdjieff.
Without describing evolution he divides matter into two kinds. He creates
his own words. He wrote in Russian and I expect some of his words are
untranslatable. One matter he calls Etherokrilno. Then there is another kind
of matter he calls Okidanokh. I have no reason to think he was describing
two universes. Omnipresent Okidanokh is unusual in that in the presence of a
higher level it separates into its three component forces. In the removal of
a higher level it reverts back to its original manifestation. The relative
combination of these three forces creates all the matter we know. This is
the basis of his description of the law of three. Everything is composed of
three forces. The interpretant then becomes a force which divides Okidanokh.
As I read your statement, I would assume that the created awareness of the
individual would be an interpretant.
Fantastic! (Or fantasy!)
Scott:
I agree: fantastic Or fantasy :-). I get nervous when comparing triads. On
obvious case is comparing Peirce's semiotic triad with the Trinity. I don't
think it makes sense to do so -- the only commonalty is that both triads are
irreducible. I am not familiar enough with Gurdjieff, but this sounds like
something I've said know and then -- that in a contradictory identity (like
form/formlessness) there is also a third word that needs to be included,
like value. I'll also mention Coleridge's formula: two forces (one expansive
and one contractive) of one Power.
- Scott
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